Tough Enough

There are a couple of themes that arc through the series of books I am writing, one of which is very much on my mind today.  I have been putting this post off all day because it is the hardest one to write so far and I wish things were different.

But I don't want to live in wish land, and the people around me know that I prefer the truth, bitter though it may be.

Several people have read The Last Prospector by now, not a huge amount, but enough opinions that I really trust have come back.  The really great news is that they all love the story so far, they are loving the characters and how things flow.  This is a huge relief to me, they are loving about the story exactly what I love about the story and are encouraging me to give them more.

But those same people are also telling me something else, that their enjoyment in reading the book is diminished by technical errors and I have made a decision.  The Last Prospector is being removed from Amazon channels effective earlier today, I had Clyde do it, it was like slaughtering a child and I couldn't make myself press the buttons.

But those buttons needed pressing, it is the only fair thing to do.  The story is too good to be saddled with amateurish errors and it's a disrespect to book, author and reader to let it go forward as it is.

About that theme I mentioned at the beginning; good things are born from bad things all the time.  Obstacles only serve to make us smarter, tougher, more resilient and more clever than before, so this is not a defeat.  It is a tactical retreat, it's time to regroup and make a new plan, a more informed plan this time.

I have learned a lot - and I still need to keep educating myself - so it is time to stop playing at this and do it right.  Big changes will be coming, The Last Prospector will be back soon and perhaps released in tandem with the second book.  We'll see, I'm not deciding anything today except that it is time to start making good decisions.

I need to thank everyone who has been supporting the book so far, they've been sharing my tweets and blog posts and I appreciate all of them.  And I am still here for them, and you; I'm not going anywhere but I am deleting yesterday's post about needing readers.  Thanks to all who responded and shared, I hope I haven't let you down.